Trump admits Russian role in hacking

US president-elect Donald Trump now accepts the intelligence community's conclusion that Russia engaged in cyber attacks during the presidential election and may take action in response, his incoming chief of staff says.

Reince Priebus said Trump believed Russia was behind the intrusions into the Democratic Party, although Priebus did not clarify whether the president-elect agreed that the hacks were directed by Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"He accepts the fact that this particular case was entities in Russia, so that's not the issue," Priebus said on Fox News Sunday.

It was the first acknowledgment from a senior member of the Republican president-elect's team that Trump accepted that Russia directed the hacking and subsequent disclosure of Democratic emails during the 2016 presidential election.

Trump had rebuffed allegations that Russia was behind the hacks or was trying to help him win, saying the intrusions could have been carried out by China or a 400-pound hacker on his bed.

With less than two weeks until his inauguration, Trump has come under increasing pressure from fellow Republicans to accept intelligence community findings on Russian hacking and other attempts by Moscow to influence the election.

An intelligence report last week said Putin directed a sophisticated influence campaign including cyber attacks to denigrate Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and support Trump.

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The report, commissioned by Democratic President Barack Obama in December, concluded vote tallies were not affected by Russian interference, but did not assess whether it influenced the outcome of the vote in other ways.

After receiving a briefing on Friday from leaders of the US intelligence agencies, Trump did not refer specifically to Russia's role in the presidential campaign.

In a statement, he acknowledged that "Russia, China, other countries, outside groups and people are consistently trying to break through the cyber infrastructure of our governmental institutions, businesses and organisations including the Democrat(ic) National Committee."

Priebus said Trump planned to order the intelligence community to make recommendations as to what should be done.

"Action may be taken," he said, adding there was nothing wrong with trying to have a good relationship with Russia and other countries.

A senior Republican senators urged Trump to punish Russia.

"In a couple weeks, Donald Trump will be the defender of the free world and democracy," Lindsey Graham told NBC.

"You should let everybody know in America, Republicans and Democrats, that you're going to make Russia pay a price for trying to interfere."

Obama told NBC he did not think he had underestimated the Russian president.

"But I think that I underestimated the degree to which, in this new information age, it is possible for misinformation for cyber hacking and so forth to have an impact on our open societies, our open systems, to insinuate themselves into our democratic practices in ways that I think are accelerating," he said.